Keep these 10 Toxic Ingredients out of Your Skincare

Logan Hailey
7 min readMar 23, 2021

Tens of thousands of toxic chemicals permeate every square inch of modern society.

The bulk of them are hiding in the seemingly harmless daily products that we slather all over our skin.

Conventional skin care products are not only loaded with allergens and irritants, but also known carcinogens (AKA cancer-causing agents).

How insane is it that humans have become so far removed from nature that we are slathering toxins all over our bodies?

We might as well be eating Vaseline lotion and Coppertone sunscreen.

Oh wait, we kind of are…

Photo by Amplitude Magazin on Unsplash

A Chemical Sponge

Your skin is the largest and most absorptive organ in your body.

Like a sponge, skin is extremely porous.

Because the skin allows substances to pass through it so easily, this permeability creates lots of problems when it comes to topical chemicals.

You are essentially ingesting your skincare products.

Everything you put on your skin goes directly into one or all of the following:

  1. your bloodstream
  2. subcutaneous fatty layers (particularly problematic since many carcinogens are fat-soluble)
  3. your lymphatic system (responsible for detoxifying the body)

Many peer-reviewed studies have found some pretty disturbing evidence of how easily chemicals absorb into our skin.

The American Journal of Public Health found that skin absorbed 29–91% of chemical contaminants in drinking water.

Another study showed that 100% of synthetic fragrances in lotions and facial creams are absorbed directly into the bloodstream.

To make matters worse, the face, underarms, and genital areas have the most permeability, absorbing up to 100% of skincare chemicals.

Photo by Timothy Dykes on Unsplash

Unregulated & Uncertain

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Logan Hailey

Vivacious nomad writer with a wild spark. Helping you optimize your wellness + mindset for the most joyful, natural, and healthy life possible.